Mystery suitors behind Salon Media $5M deal revealed as techies
Salon Media Group is being acquired for $5 million by a little-known pair of tech entrepreneurs who are meanwhile caught in a legal battle over their ownership stakes in fact-checking site Snopes.com, The Post has learned.
The winning bidders are Chris Richmond and Drew Schoentrup, who are the owners of Proper Media, a San Diego, Calif.-based ad tech firm that has been supplying ad and web design services to the struggling company for the past six months.
On Tuesday, The Post exclusively reported that Salon Media Group was being sold to an entity called Salon.com LLC. At the time, the names behind the LLC were still unknown.
“We’re doing it as individuals, 50-50,” said Richmond, who was reached Thursday at his home in San Juan, Puerto Rico. “Neither of us are political, but we like great internet brands.”
Three years ago, Richmond and Schoentrup ended up in a bitter legal battle with Snopes.com, the fact-checking site founded in the mid-1990s by husband and wife David and Barbara Mikkelson, who ended up in an acrimonious divorce in 2015.
Barbara Mikkelson sold her 50% stake to Richmond, Schoentrup and three minority partners, and several years of bitter litigation ensued.
At one point, Proper Media was withholding the ad revenue it collected for the company and Snopes was forced to set up a GoFundMe page to raise money that it needed to stay afloat. The site still survives, with David Mikkelson listed as founder and executive editor.
Richmond declined to comment on the case, which is set for trial in October in California state court.
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